It can be divided in two: the ‘flats’ principally used for the Delta Vineyard Pinot label, making up 45% of the vineyard and the ‘hills’, comprising of 55% of the vineyard which rise sharply from the ‘flats’ to 175 metres.
Over the years this site has served as a dairy, a sheep farm and, because of the splendid elevation of the hills, an airstrip, before we planted it as a vineyard in 2001 and 2002.
The shape of this land mass is very similar to the symbol for the capital Greek letter ‘delta’; hence the name given to this site on detailed topographic maps of the area.
While the focus in Marlborough is primarily on Sauvignon Blanc, the clay soil of our part of the Delta farm is considered to be too low vigour for Sauvignon, which flourishes on the loam soils closer to the Wairau River.
As the new Dijon clones of Pinot Noir came into production in Marlborough, Matt, as one of the region’s busiest consultants, noted that the best quality grapes were coming from vineyards planted on clay soils in the Southern Valleys of the Wairau.
Ron Stewart, knowing that Matt was searching for an ideal Pinot Noir site, introduced him to the sunny, north facing airstrip ridge on the Delta Farm and after a lot of thought and investigation a commitment was made to develop this site for Pinot Noir.
The clay soil, combined with the elevation of the vineyard and the factors that make Marlborough such a successful viticultural region – sunshine, warm days, the excellent quality of the light, cool nights and constant ventilation – all combine to make this site ideal for the production of top quality Pinot Noir.
The fruit from the ‘flats’ is principally used for the Delta Vineyard label which makes up two thirds of our production, while the best fruit selected from the ‘hills’ goes into the top tier Hatter’s Hill label.